Page 11
Grandma's gardenOoi Chong Jin remembers
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Page 11
Grandma's gardenOoi Chong Jin remembers |
| FOR HALF A CENTURY my grandmother was the top dog (if this is the appropriate description for her) in this ecosystem. Put in another way, she was the matriarch in a family of four sons and six daughters and numerous grandchildren. I came to live in this environment in 1952 when I was three years old and continued to stay here on and off until 1990 when the whole ecosystem was destroyed to make way for a condominium. "Green Trees" occupied a rectangular piece of land at Kelawei Road of about 200 feet by 150 feet. The building was single-storey comprising a central block with two side wings. It was built in the 1920s. The right and left side of the property had a small bamboo hedge whereas the front of the property had an ordinary hedge. Within the compound were numerous species of trees and during my association with "Green Trees" the main species were:- Banana 
Clumps
of banana plants grew in Ah Mah's compound in various spots, especially around
the open burning site. The most common and popular variety grown by Ah Mah
was the Pisang raja although some
emas variety was also grown.
During my early days before my teens the banana plants were often infested
with the banana skipper (a kind of moth) and the children (at least, I, speaking
for myself) had a devilish pleasure tormenting the larva of the banana skipper
by unwinding the part of the banana leave wound into a cheroot shape by the
growing larva. In the centre of the cheroot or cylinder of leave lay the
larva whilst undergoing metamorphosis. However in my later years the banana
skipper became less and less common and eventually disappeared. I never knew
why this happened but I guess that it was due to the progressive introduction
of human activities in the surrounding environment outside Ah Mah's compound.Ah Mah's pisang raja gave us nutrition as well as a lot of eating pleasure. The bananas were harvested whilst pah chooi but not ready for eating and then stored in various nooks and corners of the house whilst they ripened. When they turned sufficiently yellow they were ready for eating. . |
| The fruit
was eaten uncooked, fried as goreng pisang,or
kueh kodok. During those days
I believe nobodyworried about too much
fat in the diet. Although deep fried goreng
pisang or kueh kodok was
full of oil, we wolfed them down without a bother. In retrospect Ah Mah's
goreng pisang was lacking
in quality compared to the crispy and crunching goreng pisang we can now
buy at 40 to 50 cents a piece from the professional goreng pisang frier. However as children
we never knew the difference nor had the experience of eating outside
goreng pisang Ah Mah's domain
was almost self-sufficient The other way of eating the pisang was to cook it in pungat with yam, sweet potato, sugar and coconut milk. In order to do this the pisang must be left to "over ripe" ( i.e. to become too mushy and sticky when eaten uncooked). The banana is then peeled, cut into pieces of about 1 ½ to 2 inches Chiku My grandmother's chiku tree was of an excellent breed. The fruits were as big as apples but few in numbers. The other type of chiku which one sees bears many (in clusters) but small fruits. Our chikus were sweet and had good texture. The chiku tree has hardy branches and numerous occupants of Greenwood had the fun of climbing this tree to reach out for the chikus which are normally borne at the ends of the branches. The other way of plucking chikus was to use an A-shape ladder, climb on top of it and reach out for the chikus. Many a time I found another way of reaching for the fruit: climb the tree and swing over to the roof of the house and whilst standing on the roof pull in the branches and pluck the fruit, one by one. It was lucky that the roof did not ever cave in or I would not now be writing this recollection. The fourth way we plucked the chiku was with a bamboo pole on top of which we fixed a small basket, poked the ckiku with the pole-basket and hope that the chiku would separate from its stalk and gracefully drop into the basket. Any chiku which did not drop into the basket would land on the ground or at worst onto the pavement surrounding the house. In such a case the fruit would be seriously damaged or bruised and not fit for eating afterwards. One of the hazards in plucking this fruit is that once plucked the stalk left on the tree will start to bleed latex which sometimes drips on your head and tangles up your hair into knots. Only ripe fruits are to be plucked. At the tip of each fruit is a prick which drops off naturally when the fruit is about ripe for plucking. The ripe fruit is also distinguished by its size (bigger than the unripe fruits on the tree) and its smoother skin. Once the fruits were plucked I usually immersed them in a pail of water to wash them as well as brush away the coarse grains of the skin. At this stage the fruits feel hard when pressed with the fingers. The fruits are then dried and kept in a rice jar buried superficially in rice and checked every day. The fruit is ready for eating when it feels soft when gently pressed. At the same time it exudes a nice fragrance. One normally then peels of the skin with a sharp knife and then cut the fruit into half or quarters. The central whitish core of the fruit is sliced off as it contains the sap or latex which is bitter. |
| From this mother chiku tree marcots were made and transplanted to various spots in the garden as well as to Uncle Hin's house in Taiping (if I remember correctly) as well as Uncle Bah's house in Ampang, Kuala Lumpur. The other fun which I had over this chiku tree was as an exercise machine. As stated earlier the tree is very hardy and a horizontal branch of say 2 inches in diameter could carry a body weight of 150 to 200 pounds. For many years, until the property was taken over by the developer, I used to shin up this particular branch of the mother chiku tree to build my biceps and triceps. I even hung like a bat from this branch with my legs wrapped around it Coconuts The coconut palms were a source of entertainment, psychotherapy and nourishment for the denizens of Greenwood. A few times every year the Indian coconut plucker would visit the premises and have a business transaction with my grandmother (Ah Mah). Some of the fruits he plucked would be sold to him at a price to be negotiated and some would be left and kept at the house for domestic consumption. Ah Mah would pick a safe and shady spot in the garden and sit herself down on a stool and watch the man going about his job. We children would wtach spellbound as the man climbed the coconut tree easily like an agile monkey. The coconut plucker strung a belt or rope around both his ankles to help him clasp the trunk of the tree between his feet as he shinnedup the trunk. We had coconut palms of various ages and height and some of the palms were over 70 feet in height. When the master climber reached the top of the tree he would use his long sickle-shape-bladed parang to cut of the coconuts from their pods. Coconuts drop to the ground with a loud thud and they will then bounce all over the place unpredictably. If you are not careful and do not place yourself in a strategic spot you could very well get a bouncing coconut in your mouth. A coconut has the size of a size 6 football and weighs about 6-8 pounds. Therefore watching coconuts being plucked and falling is fun. As always the children would badger Ah Mah to negotiate with the Indian plucker to pluck for us some young coconuts. The young coconuts make a delicious drink with its sweet water and soft and juicy flesh or meat. It is not easy to get young coconuts. Any young coconuts falling from a high tree would burst on hitting the ground and the water would be lost, imbibed by the thirsty ground. Therefore the plucker, if he was in the right disposition, would carry down one or two young coconuts from the top of the tree for us, the children. It is believed that the coconut water from the young nuts makes the mind "cheng" or peaceful. When the coconut man finished his job on all the palms assigned for the day the children would help him gather all the coconuts and heap them in a shady spot. The coconut man then proceeded to take out a sharp spear which would then be firmly embedded to the ground with the spear head sticking out about 3 feet above ground level.. |
| With a skill, quite fascinating
to watch, he would proceed to deftly push the coconut against the upright
spear and remove the husk from each coconut Through the years I have tried to carry out this task myself but never came close to any semblance of success. One reason is that when you are pushing the quite slippery coconut against the upright spear and if you are not carefui and skillful enough you could be pushing your abdomen against the spear and get yourself impaled. Dehusking coconuts is easier observed than done. When all the mature coconuts had been dehusked, all the time watched by our eagle-eyed Ah Mah a certain portion would be given to the coconut man (in lieu of any wage that might otherwise demand) to be put in his gunny sack and taken away whilst the balance would be kept in the kongsi for future consumption. Coconut is a very versatile ingredient for processed food. The meat is disintegrated and the resultant pulp is squeezed for its milk. At the beginning of my experience disintegration of the meat was done by scraping broken pieces of the dehusked coconut against a sharp serrated spoon affixed in the mouth of a small wooden horse with the scraper sitting on the back of this horse. 
The coconut milk was used for making various kinds of curry including Ah
Mah's famous hoo pow (or otak-otak). The coconut milk was also
a major ingredient of Ah Mah's kaya
which is made of eggs, sugar and coconut milk. The egg white and yolk, sugar
and coconut milk are mixed and stirred until you get a thick liquid which
is then put in a cooking pot and steamed for about 2 hours in a black quali.
The final product is sweet & thick consistency like marmalade.Every year before Chinese New Year Ah Mah would spend many days making kueh kapek (or love letters), a major ingredient being coconut milk. This was an annual tradition of Ah Mah but of which she made a small annual income. I believe that as her children prospered and she became more financially secure our Ah Mah tended to give away (FOC) more of her kueh kapek than sell them. Currently in the middle 90's kueh kapek costs about RM10.00 per hundred pieces. I also believed that when Ah Mah was younger, before she was 60, she used to bake the kueh kapek herself. However my best memory of the kueh kapek was of the Malay woman (Tok we called her) coming every year to bake the kueh kapek for several days just before Chinese New Year. The grandchildren (like Ruby, Shirley, Beng Choo whom I remember best, because they were around my age and also living at Greenwood) used to sit around the kueh kapek baker and help ourselves to the freshly baked kueh kapek without any protest from the adults! One person bakes the kueh kapek and another folds the kueh kapek into quadrants (hence the name love letters). The most determined folder was Ah Cheng Ee. The ingredients of kueh kapek are coconut milk, rice and tapioca, flour, sugar, eggs mixed together to give a light yellow liquid of some thickness which is scooped and placed and squeezed between the two hot plates of the |
kueh kapek "press" and placed over a
charcoal fire. When the hot plates are squeezed some of the liquid or gruel
will exude out of the hot plates and stick to the edges. When the baking,
which lasts a few seconds, depending on the fire, is complete the cooked
exudant is carefully lifted off from the edges of the hot plates before the
plates are opened and the round kueh kapek is gently but skillfully scraped
off and folded into quadrants or rolled into "cigars" for the children to
munch.
The scraped
off exudant (kueh kapek p'hi) or
the kueh kapek tailings are not
discarded but are part of another tasty delight The kueh kapek p'hi can be munched just like
that When eaten fresh or kept in an air tight tin it retains its crunchiness
(somewhat like popcorn). The best way I enjoyed eating the kueh kapek p'hi is over breakfast on
another day mixed with coffee and with a little butter added (just like eating
cornflakes mixed with milk). When was the last time, if ever, you enjoyed
this little pleasure of the palate? For me it has been years - the good old
times.In the earlier days we used to cook over a wood fire. Charcoal was seldom used. I do not know why. Gas was then not available. Husk left over from the operation of the coconut man was left to dry in the sun and the dried husk was kept in the garage away from rain and used as part of the fuel for cooking. Another use of the coconut is as a potent medicine for curing ringworm. The shell of the coconut after the meat has been scraped off is dried in the sun and a piece of the cup-shaped shell is place atop of a small charcoal fire. As the shell heats up droplets of liquid would gather at the bottom of the cup. When enough, about lO cc, this is accumulated, then cooled and drained off into a container and hey presto you get a natural ringworm killer. Once when I had some ringworm around my waist I applied the homemade medicine with some cotton wool onto the patches of my ringwormed skin. The liquid hit the skin with a burning sensation : it sure suited me because there is nothing like pain to get rid of itch. After a few applications daily my skin burned and peeled off. The new skin which generated from below was ringworm free. Very often when the coconut man cut down the coconuts he was also to cut down the coconut fronds. The fronds are then collected by Lau Hor (Lau Hee) or Ah Lee Ee and the individual leaves are then sliced off the main stalk bundled up for easy carrying into the kitchen area of the house. At convenient times in the afternoon or after dinner people like Ah Lee Ee Lau Hor and me (who else?) would sit on a bangku and shave off the leafy blade from the central stem of each leave with a reasonably sharp knife. If the knife is too sharp it may cut through the stem into your finger. In the first part of the process you could work on 2, 3 or 4 leaves at a.time. In the final process you would have to work on one leave at a time so that you would end up with a closely shaven stem (the Iili). The lilis are then dried in the sun and collected into bundles of maybe 100 sticks each (I never thought of counting) mainly by Ah Mah and bound closely together using a rattan ring. |
| The making
or weaving of the rattan ring is quite fascinating to watch and I always
marveled at how skillful Ah Mah was. Too bad I never learned
this art from her. I wonder whether any of her surviving relatives are able
to do this. The end product is a broom of lilis. The brooms were exported to the
homes of Ah Mah's children in Taiping, KL and Singapore. Nothing beats this
kind of broom for sweeping away unwanted pools of water on the floor. My
function was strictly restricted to shaving the leave blades off the stem.
Once you get the hang of it (and it is easy to get the hang of it) you could
do it almost unconsciously. This is when your mind relaxes and you might get yourself into a meditative state forgetting about the woes of the world. If not you could end up slicing into your fingers. As the green leave blades are being shaved off a smell of green (chlorophyll) is exuded reminding ourselves perhaps of our distant evolutionary past when we were swinging from the trees. Somehow I find that the smell of green is a peaceful smell. Each round of psycho-therapy or rejuvenation could last from 15 minutes to an hour or more. Cocunut leaves are versatile and can be woven into mats. One single leaf can be rolled into a whistle. 
Climbing a coconut palm is one of the toughest exercise a young boy could
undertake. Unlike the professional coconut man you do not have a rope to
tie around your ankles to act as a vice for your feet. Unlike other types
of trees there are no branches for you to hold or step on as you ascend.
When you climb a coconut palm you ascend almost perpendicularly using your
feet as a vice and hugging the tree with your aims. You push yourself up
with your legs and pull yourself up with your arms. Some of you readers may
remember (black) John and Jeffrey, who were expert coconut palm climbers.
I climbed the shorter trees a few times. Normally I considered myself quite
fit and could manage to climb and descend the palm quite well. However one
time after my HSC Exams after I had led an almost sedentary life for about
6 weeks I went to Batu Ferringhi with some friends for a picnic. In the exhilaration
of the moment which one feels after finishing a series of serious exams I
climbed a coconut palm, plucked the coconuts but on way down I found that
I had lost my strength. I couldn't control my descent and shinned down the
trunk scraping the skin off my thighs and crotch and for several days afterwards
had to walk "kang-kang".#(to be continued) Notes: kang kang - walking with legs wide apart Go to the top |
| ______ INDEX Point to the article that you want to read, and CLICK Index page The Baling meeting Book review Food guide The god in the garden Grandma's garden Letter from Pulau Tikus Malay words from Chinese The mistress of ceremonies<> |
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Editorial consultants: Mr and Mrs Lim Teong Beng Technical advisor: Tony Ooi Thanks to Robyn Choi for her assistance this issue Thanks to "The Penang Palate" for
the use of coconut scraper and kuay kapek mould illustrations |
If you have any photos of old Penang which you would like published please send them to 35 Halaman Batu Maung 11960 Batu Maung Penang and we shall return them to you after publication We have prepared an Index to The Penang File. If you are interested in having a copy please CLICK "thePenangfileIndex" giving your name, address as well as your email address ____________________ The Penang File Issue 39 |